U.N. officials fear the sex-abuse scandal among peacekeepers in Africa is far more widespread and appears to be a problem in each of the global body's 16 missions around the world....Rocked by widespread abuse of women and girls, including gang rape, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the United Nations also has found sexual exploitation cases in at least four other missions -- in Burundi, Liberia, Ivory Coast -- as well as more recently in Haiti, they added.

Sunday, February 27, 2005

10. You never could throw your full support behind John Kerry once you found out his first name is found in the Bible, of all places.

9. One of the few reasons you couldn't bring yourself to assasinate the president is you'd have to actually buy a gun.

8. Your opinions and values carry more weight than those that oppose you, because you care.

7. To save money you bought an effigy of Bush made of asbestos. You later returned it when you realized 'the bush burned with fire, but the bush was not consumed.' is ALSO found in the Bible.

6. You believe the death penalty should be abolished...after it's applied to those that support it.

5. You believe that any news service that doesn't keep 'Bush is EV1L Incarnate' as its lead story is undeniably linked to a Vast Right Wing Conspiracy.

4. Four years later and you are STILL protesting outside the Broward County Courthouse for Gore-Lieberman 2000.

3. You have made a sign which you carry to every protest that just says 'NO!'. It's written in your own blood from when you carved 'I'm Sorry, World' on your forehead.

2. You acknowlege the 'Vast Right Wing Conspiracy' exists and is inherently evil but often lose sleep at night worrying there are smaller 'Widespread Right Wing Conspiracies' that need to be stamped out too and aren't getting the attention they deserve.

And the number one Indicator You May Be Left of Liberal....

1. You strongly believe cannibalism is wrong. Not because it takes a human life but because it's...meat.

Friday, February 25, 2005

The substantive case against Gannon is trivial; the irrelevant case against him (the one that's fueled this story) is that he's gay, has allegedly been (or still may be) a prostitute, and may not agree with everything the gay left believes (although I agree with David Corn that the evidence that Gannon has written anything even remotely "anti-gay" is laughable). The real scandal is the blatant use of homophobic rhetoric by the self-appointed Savonarolas of homo-left-wingery. It's an Animal Farm moment: the difference between a fanatic on the gay left and a fanatic on the religious right is harder and harder to discern. Just ask yourself: if a Catholic conservative blogger had found out that a liberal-leaning pseudo-pundit/reporter was a gay sex worker, had outed the guy as gay and a "hooker," published pictures of the guy naked, and demanded a response from a Democratic administration, do you think gay rights groups would be silent? They'd rightly be outraged. But the left can get away with anything, can't they? Especially homophobia.

How did you spend your three-day weekend? According to the shambles of our mailbox, you spent it drinking heavily and obsessing over Jeff Gannon, Karl Rove, Rush Limbaugh, and the Gay Mafia of the Republican Party. Could someone who hasn't lost their tinfoil hat email us soon? It's getting freaky in here.

Ms. Plame is the wife of Joseph Wilson, the CIA consultant who wrote a July 2003 op-ed in the Times accusing the Bush Administration of lying about yellow cake uranium ore from Niger. The allegation became a political cause celebre at the time, though a year later both a British and a U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee probe found that the White House had been accurate and that Mr. Wilson was the one who hadn't told the truth.

Meanwhile, amid the uproar, someone told Mr. Novak that Mr. Wilson had been recommended for the Niger project within the CIA by none other than his own wife, Ms. Plame. Mr. Novak duly reported that fact, which nobody noticed until Democrats and the media began to express outrage that a CIA agent had been "outed," and that this was supposedly a crime under the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act.

In fact, it is almost certainly not a crime. That statute was intended to stop the treasonous betrayal of secret agents in the field by the likes of the notorious Philip Agee, and it requires a prosecutor to show that the discloser identified a "covert agent" knowing that the agent had been undercover in a foreign country within the last five years. For an official who had no such knowledge, the law also requires that the prosecutor show a pattern of exposing agents.

It's far-fetched to believe that Mr. Novak's sources were culpable under any of these terms. Ms. Plame was safely ensconced at CIA's Langley headquarters, and if anything her husband was the one who first compromised her when he went public with accusations about the CIA consulting job that she had recommended him for. Once Mr. Wilson made himself part of a political campaign against the Bush Administration and the Iraq War, his wife's role was bound to become public.

As one comment points out: "Matt Drudge got into a press briefing of the White House which approved a lawsuit against him... So again, this idea that it is difficult is nonsense."

Where was the outrage when the Crazy Old Aunt of the Left asked questions like:

"At the earlier briefing, Ari, you said that the President deplored the taking of innocent lives. Does that apply to all innocent lives in the world? And I have a follow-up." . . ."My follow-up is, why does he want to drop bombs on innocent Iraqis?"

Another poster nails it with:

The screaming hypocrisy here isn't the uptight White House giving a daily press pass to a former gay escort (especially in light of Bush's expressed tolerance for gay folks), the hypocrisy here is the allegedly pro-gay left's willingness to out a gay man in order to destroy his career and advance their political agenda.

My boss's daughter called on Friday. She alerted him to an interesting development in her history class. The teacher told them that since they were ahead in the lesson plan, the class could take a vote on what movie to watch. The choices, you ask? Fahrenheit 9/11 or Bowling for Columbine.

Yup, the public schools work their magic yet again. Before the day was over, the superintendent and school principal were trying to track down the teacher to find out what the hell was going on.

It's good to see that some students and parents stood up against this.

There's an alert blogger around every corner, it seems. Rep. Maurice D. Hinchey, New York Democrat, accused White House adviser Karl Rove of "planting" the forged memos used by CBS anchor Dan Rather in an attempt to discredit President Bush's Vietnam-era National Guard service. Mr. Hinchey was speaking at a community forum in Ithaca, N.Y., on Sunday when he launched into what was described as "a barking moonbat conspiracy rant worthy of the Democratic Underground," according to Little Green Footballs (LGF) " a popular political Web log.An LGF reader tape-recorded the lawmaker "telling the audience he believed the fakeCBS memos were planted by Mr. Rove to discredit Mr. Rather and divert attention from President Bush's 'draft dodging.' " The reader asked Mr. Hinchey whether he had evidence. First, he said "Yes, I do," but when pressed, admitted that he did not. The reader persisted, asking, "Don't you think it's irresponsible to make charges like that?" Mr. Hinchey replied, "No, I don't. I think it's very important to make charges like that. I think it's very important to combat this kind of activity in every way that you can, and I'm willing, as most people are not, to step forward in situations like this and take risks. I consider that to be part of my job, and I'm going to continue to do it."

Friday, February 18, 2005

I saw a reference to Flickr in Ambotchka's blog. She said that it was a good window to the rest of the world, which she needed since she was serving in Iraq. I signed up to see what she was talking about.

I watched Judy Woodruff's Inside Politics today, and their "blog reporter" seemed incredulous that political bloggers hadn't picked up on the Michael Jackson trial. It's really simple. It's not a political issue. Michael Jackson, as far as I know, doesn't dabble in politics. So the question becomes "what business does Inside Politics have bringing it up." Can't be that hard to fill an hour.

Mr Moroney said that, as part of the blitz, thousands of weapons were destroyed because police were not satisfied that the firearms were being kept securely, or that "possession of that firearm was necessarily further warranted".

Howard Dean, the new chairman of the Democratic National Committee, requested a media blackout of a debate with top Pentagon adviser Richard Perle, then quickly changed his mind yesterday after news agencies complained, the Associated Press reports. "DNC Chair Howard Dean has declared a news blackout of his appearance and requested the media not quote, record, and/or paraphrase his remarks," event coordinator Gabrielle Williams wrote in an e-mail sent to news agencies yesterday morning. "We apologize for the late notice, but we were just informed of this request." Less than two hours later, Miss Williams called to say: "We were told just a few minutes ago that it is now open" for media coverage. The decision to open today's debate came roughly 30 minutes after an inquiry by the AP. Dean spokeswoman Laura Gross said her boss had decided the event would be closed before he was elected DNC chairman Saturday, but changed his mind because of his new job.

When you hear name-calling like what we've been hearing from the elite media this week, you know someone must be doing something right. The hysterical edge makes you wonder if writers for newspapers and magazines and professors in J-schools don't have a serious case of freedom envy.

The bloggers have that freedom. They have the still pent-up energy of a liberated citizenry, too. The MSM doesn't. It has lost its old monopoly on information. It is angry.

The problem for Montopoli and other liberals is they seem to think that the need for an adversarial press emerged in 2001, when President Bush was first inaugurated. If we travel back to the Clinton era, it’s not hard to discover a whole chorus of White House reporters who, to use Montopoli’s words, squandered their access to Clinton with helpful softball questions, who put his agenda ahead of the public good and made a partisan spectacle of themselves in front of a large number of Americans who wanted the press to act as a watchdog of President Clinton.

Tuesday, February 15, 2005

Kojo Annan, the son of U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, played a far more extensive role than previously revealed in a company that won a key contract under the scandal-plagued Iraq oil-for-food program, Senate investigators have learned. Investigators also have uncovered documents suggesting that Benon Sevan, the U.N. official who oversaw the seven-year program and was suspended last week, had a much more direct interest in laundered oil deals handed out as bribes by Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein under the program. One Iraqi internal investigation put Mr. Sevan's profits at $1.2 million, nearly 10 times the previous estimate.

Monday, February 14, 2005

A recent panel discussion included pundits from the left and right. The panel included two female talk radio hosts.From the right, the national syndicated Laura Ingraham. From the left, Air America (heard in what, three cities?) host Janeanne Garafalo.

Let's compare bios here:Ms. Ingraham has a law degree, served as a White House speach writer, was a Supreme Court Law Clerk and made a living as a criminal defense attorney. She also has several best selling books on politics to her credit.

Ms. Garafalo has appeared in a series of truely awful movies. The best of the pack being her role as "The Bowler" in Mystery Men. Prior to moving to the left coast, she did standup in the Northeast. I remember seeing her in comedy club in Cambridge. Most of her act consisted of her whining about having no money and how her college education wasn't doing her any good. It seems that it still isn't.

It was pretty much a given that the Shiites would be big winners in the recent Iraqi elections.They are the clear majority in the country. Why are we hearing so much concern about the "disenfranchised" Sunni population?I don't recall hearing much about disenfranchised Afrikaners after the first free elections in South Africa.

Saturday, February 12, 2005

UN peacekeepers have been banned from all sex with the local population in Congo because of widespread, continuing abuse of women and girls. In the past year the UN investigated 150 allegations against 50 soldiers of sexual exploitation of women and girls.

Children as young as 12 or 13 were bribed with eggs, milk or a few dollars in exchange for sex, UN reports said.

UN regulations for soldiers usually forbid sex with anyone under 18 and forced prostitution. But often officials found there was a fine line between forced and willing sex.

Friday, February 11, 2005

Thursday, February 10, 2005

From the political ghetto of an RPG discussion forum, comes this rather good and on target summary

Cheney and Rumsfeld aren't malicious, they are simply grey suit men, guys who have been in and around the seats of power, both government and business, for long periods of time. Both parties have them, and they are used to being able to switch from the public to private sectors with ease. It's only this latest cycle that there has been scrutiny of this type, and interestingly enough, only of a certain political stripe, with the Democrats guys of the same type being ignored. Funny how that works...

As for Dr. Rice, she is just about the most intelligent person ever to hold her job. She could be making FAR more in the private sector, but is choosing to lend her considerable talents to the current administration. With the malicious attacks on her and her reputation for this I wouldn't hold it against her if she left public service, never to return, but I certainly hope not. We can ill afford to have genius leave public service at a time when things are in flux

Other Deaniacs were exultant, sort of, about Dean’s impending takeover of the DNC.

“We won!” said one.

“We finally got a victory party!” said another.

“Yeah, ‘cause everybody else dropped out,” said a third, referring to Frost, Webb, Fowler, Roemer, and the rest of Dean’s former rivals for the DNC post.

That gutless coward, Jim Jeffords came out as a democrat at the same time. As Mike reminds us, Jeffords, who was elected as a Republican, kept claming he was a “moderate” and an “independent.” It seems he was lying.

The House overwhelmingly passed a nonbinding resolution yesterday urging the Defense Department to continue its long-standing support of the Boy Scouts of America — a response supporters say is necessary to counter attacks on the group by some liberal organizations. "Once again, we find the Boy Scouts of America under attack from the American Civil Liberties Union," said Rep. Joel Hefley, Colorado Republican, who sponsored the resolution, which passed 418-7, with only a handful of Democrats opposing it.The Defense Department in November agreed to warn military bases that department policy does not allow them to be official sponsors of Boy Scout units and that military personnel may sponsor Boy Scout groups only in their off-duty capacity. The action was in response to an ongoing ACLU lawsuit that challenges a range of federal support to the Boy Scouts, because the group administers a religious oath. Mr. Hefley's resolution urges the Defense Department to "continue to exercise its long-standing statutory authority to support the activities of the Boy Scouts of America," and would particularly encourage continued support for the national and world Boy Scout jamborees, which are periodically held on military property. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, Tennessee Republican, plans similar Senate legislation. Rep. Jack Kingston, Georgia Republican, said Boy Scouts stress God, family and country, "which, of course, the ACLU can't stand." No Democrats took to the floor to oppose the resolution during its brief debate yesterday morning. Rep. Ike Skelton of Missouri was one of few Democrats to speak and he "wholeheartedly" endorsed Mr. Hefley's proposal, praising the Boy Scouts as "one of the finest organizations in our country."

Tens of thousands of illegal immigrants are driving without licenses on Massachusetts streets...."These people are absolutely desperate to comply with the law," said Isaac Hodes, community organizer at the Irish Immigration Center. (Emphasis added.)

If they really were "absolutely desperate to comply with the law", they would be heading to the INS offices and not the RMV.

... what we're getting, in what is surely one of history's greatest ironies, is liberals demanding rigid adherence to the past while conservatives are pushing change for the future ... liberals seem determined to stand or fall upon a defense of things as they are - they have become reactionaries; disdaining change not because of what it might do, but because it is change.

Growing number of women are using guns for self-defense -- and funBy Emily Sweeney, Globe Staff - February 6, 2005

BRAINTREE -- It was finally Saturday, and Kathy Hynes was winding down from her week of work. Dressed neatly in white turtleneck, red sweater, and jeans, she raised her 9mm semiautomatic pistol, and gently squeezed the trigger.

Bang!

A bullet ripped through a square paper target hanging 50 feet away. Behind tinted safety goggles, her eyes kept focused on the target's black and white circles. Hynes pulled the trigger again and again, peppering her target in the indoor range of the Braintree Rifle & Pistol Club.

It was a typical Saturday afternoon for members of the Second Amendment Sisters, a women's gun rights group that they call Sass.

Since it was founded in 1999, the Texas-based organization has grown to about 10,000 members with chapters in 30 states, said Lee Ann Tarducci, director of operations for Second Amendment Sisters. The Massachusetts chapter has 130 members.

Promotional pamphlets feature a single red rose and the group's slogan, "Self defense is a basic human right."

I strongly believe that terrorists are cowards but the cowardice you’re going to see in this story is just exceptional.

The suicide attack that was performed on an election center in one of Baghdad's districts (Baghdad Al-Jadeedah) last Sunday was performed using a kidnapped "Down Syndrome" patient.

Eye witnesses said (and I'm quoting one of my colleagues; a dentist who lives there) "the poor victim was so scared when ordered to walk to the searching point and began to walk back to the terrorists. In response the criminals pressed the button and blew up the poor victim almost half way between their position and the voting center's entrance".

"...each year we hack 400 million more tons of coal out of Earth's crust than we did a quarter century before, light it on fire, and shoot the proceeds into the atmosphere."......coal-burning electric power plants have fouled the air with enough heavy metals and other noxious pollutants to cause 15,000 premature deaths annually in the US alone, according to a Harvard School of Public Health study. Believe it or not, a coal-fired plant releases 100 times more radioactive material than an equivalent nuclear reactor - right into the air, too, not into some carefully guarded storage site. (And, by the way, more than 5,200 Chinese coal miners perished in accidents last year.)

Burning hydrocarbons is a luxury that a planet with 6 billion energy-hungry souls can't afford. There's only one sane, practical alternative: nuclear power. ...Radiation containment, waste disposal, and nuclear weapons proliferation are manageable problems in a way that global warming is not. Unlike the usual green alternatives - water, wind, solar, and biomass - nuclear energy is here, now, in industrial quantities....Some of the world's most thoughtful greens have discovered the logic of nuclear power, including Gaia theorist James Lovelock, Greenpeace cofounder Patrick Moore, and Britain's Bishop Hugh Montefiore, a longtime board member of Friends of the Earth. Western Europe is quietly backing away from planned nuclear phaseouts. Finland has ordered a big reactor specifically to meet the terms of the Kyoto Protocol on climate change. China's new nuke plants - 26 by 2025 - are part of a desperate effort at smog control.

France, where nukes generate more than three-quarters of the country's electricity, is privatizing a third of its state-owned nuclear energy group, Areva, to deal with the rush of new business.

The more seriously you take the idea of global warming, the more seriously you have to take nuclear power. Clean coal, solar-powered roof tiles, wind farms in North Dakota - they're all pie in the emissions-free sky. Sure, give them a shot. But zero-carbon reactors are here and now. We know we can build them. Their price tag is no mystery. They fit into the existing electric grid without a hitch. Flannel-shirted environmentalists who fight these realities run the risk of ending up with as much soot on their hands as the slickest coal-mining CEO.

A couple of men walking home in Cuba get arrested for "hanging out in a tourist zone" and I am here in exile telling fidel castro to kiss my ass.

Somewhere on that island, in quite a few somewheres actually, there are independent journalists and librarians rotting away in castro's gulags simply because they attempted to do exactly what I do here on this blog.

Freedom is a beautiful thing, folks. Take it in. Hold it. Embrace it. Bask in it. Revel in it. Not everyone is blessed with it.